Élégie (CD) – Anita Rachvelishvili

Composers: Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Otar Taktakishvili, Paolo Tosti, Henri Duparc, Manuel de Falla
Artists: Anita Rachvelishvili, Vincenzo Scalera
Number of Discs: 1
Label: Sony Classical
CD Release Date: May 20, 2021

Anita Rachvelishvili’s second album Élégie showcases her in the song repertoire to which she has a special connection, despite being best known as a star of the world's greatest opera houses. Riccardo Muti has called the Georgian singer “without doubt the best Verdi mezzo-soprano today on the planet,” but here she reveals another side to her art. The repertoire is notable for its variety, featuring five languages (Russian, Georgian, Italian, French and Spanish), and correspondingly, five very different repertoire traditions.

“I really love this repertoire. It gives one more colors and more possibilities for expressing emotions with the voice,” says Anita Rachvelishvili. Echoing her debut album of operatic arias, she introduces listeners to a great (if internationally neglected) Georgian composer, Otar Taktakishvili, heard in “The Sun of October,” a setting of the distinguished Georgian poet Galaktion Tabidze. Also included are Rachmaninov’s setting of the Pushkin poem “Oh never sing to me again” and Tchaikovsky’s “None but the lonely heart.”

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